


Pumped up kicks

by snoozingkitten



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M, Season 3 what if
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-09
Updated: 2013-01-09
Packaged: 2017-11-24 07:48:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/632101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snoozingkitten/pseuds/snoozingkitten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was world war year three, the first day of school and Stiles was trying to storm the trenches and being battered by enemy fire. Axis and Allies and all the subtle shifts of power that was high school with the added drama of the supernatural elements acting out like a great furry bunch of drama queens.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pumped up kicks

**Author's Note:**

> A massive thank you to track_04 @ LJ and nanyakanya @ LJ for the bang-up beta job. I only write the words, they make them make sense.
> 
> Originally written for Teen Wolf Holiday exchange 2012

_One does not simply walk into Mordor._

Stiles stared at the doors of the school with the oddest feeling of dread twisting like an imaginary mountain lion in his stomach. Well no, not odd. Enough weird shit has gone down in these hallowed halls to fill the whole Guinness World Records book. If Stiles could tell the active voice from the passive voice, he might have written a book about it. He’d name it ‘My Dog Spot’ and it would begin: ‘My dog Spot was an asshole, he had this bone he loved named Allison and then shit went down.’ It would be the next Harry Potter. 

Like all the worst déjà vu, Lydia strode up the steps in a storm of hairspray and mauve (the _in_ colour for the season) hair bouncing with loose curls and perfect pink lip gloss. “Hey Lydia,” Stiles said with a smile; it had been long months since he’d seen her. She’d more or less pitched a fit and left, sunning in Greece or something. Allison had vanished too, her house still and empty, and Scott knew because he couldn’t seem to keep away, like he couldn’t keep from telling Stiles about it so Stiles knew too. Scott was too poor to take a health break and Stiles’ Dad had just lost half the force in a freak attack on the station and well, Stiles wasn’t going anywhere. He was old hat with living with ghosts anyways. 

Jackson hadn’t come back right away either. Derek and Peter had taken him and Stiles didn’t want to stick his nose in that affair, no matter how Scott _pined_ to find out. Scott clearly cared too much for everyone. The worst that could happen was that Jackson invested in a leather jacket too. (He was lying to himself and it was a pale and pathetic lie, but he was going to cling to it because he’d been through hell and he didn’t want anything more.) It was over and for that he was pathetically grateful. 

Lydia paused, pursed her lips and gave him a curt nod before continuing on her way. Which was a decided improvement. Funny how death put things in perspective. 

“Hey man,” Stiles said when Scott appeared at his side. At some point he had stopped making sound when he walked and somewhere in there Stiles had even begun to accept that as normal. 

“Ready?” Scott squared his shoulders and squinted at the sign above the door that read: Beacon Hills High School. 

“First day of the rest of our lives,” Stiles said without a lot of feeling--unless you counted sarcasm as feeling. 

“That’s the spirit.” Scott clapped him on the shoulder and together they set off into the school. 

Stiles herded towards homeroom with the rest of the sheep. He’d had the whole summer to get used to the fact that normal life went on anyway, even when he was going to shatter and scream. Scott was in a different homeroom but they shared English and PE. 

In the front left corner of the room Allison sat there, her hair cut into a chin-length bob, and Stiles did a comic double-take when he realized it was her. Her hair had been so long and just so much a part of what Stiles understood as ‘Allison’, but he couldn’t begrudge her whatever crutch she needed. In the back, sulking like a pair of alley-cats, Isaac and Erica sat at opposite ends of the room. They didn’t seem to have changed much; Erica had swapped out her leather coat for a form-fitting knit ensemble that matched the blood red of her lipstick. 

She gave him a little wave while Isaac seemed content to ignore his presence entirely. 

Curled into the corner under the window, Jackson had his head pillowed on his hands, noticeable only after Stiles sat behind him and he could see five scars on the back of his neck just where his hair was close-shorn. Jackson didn’t look up after the teacher began to speak. 

Stiles had to remind himself several times that school wasn’t redundant what with everything that had seemed bigger and more important. That he’d ruined his Dad’s life enough without having to drag him to awkward parent-teacher meetings. Hopefully this new regime would last even as the minute hand seemed to slow down and drag the gaps between seconds spilling over onto each other under it seemed like it wasn’t moving at all. 

“Before your next periods there will be an assembly,” Ms. Smith said with that same sort of pack-a-day death rattle that she said everything else in. 

Stiles hadn’t meant to sit next to Jackson; it was just the way they fell into line and Stiles was still working on figuring out what to say to Allison. Knowing what it felt like to lose a parent didn’t given any special insight. He liked her enough when she wasn’t inadvertently driving Scott to do stupid things or shooting at things like some Laura Croft wanna-be. Erica was crazy as a bag of cats, and despite what Scott said, Stiles was in no rush to be Isaac’s best friend. It honestly hadn’t occurred to him that now they he played sports he could make other friends. (Who needed other friends when he had Scott?) And so he was sitting next to Jackson. 

“Good morning students. Welcome to the 2012-2013 school year. Let me be the first to welcome to new students and the first to wish luck to our students in the final stretch, you’re going to need it! All joking aside, I’d like to give a warm welcome to everyone.” The principle, a new man yet again. Older, but not old, with silver streaking at his temples and a deep southern crawl of a voice. Stiles bet himself a twenty that the guy was a vampire or a necromancer, or this would get all Buffy and he’d open the gates to hell in the high school. Was he Buffy? 

Oh shit. He was Willow. He was a lesbian witch and _thank Christ_ he wasn’t in love with the werewolf because he loved his dick way too much to put it anywhere near Derek and his snappy teeth. 

“You all have read or heard the news.” The principle began and a cold chill crawled down his spine and Stiles bit the inside of his cheek. “Last year was a time of change and the events that unfolded shook up the community, but I’d like us to show them that we are strong, that the future generations are willing to pick up the slack.” 

Stiles made a disbelieving sound in the back of this throat.

Beside him, Jackson curled in on himself, shoulders hunched and down. Stiles only noticed because they were crammed in the auditorium and Jackson’s shoulders had been warm in the intense air conditioning and were suddenly gone. 

“Dude?” Stiles whispered. 

“Get lost,” Jackson snarled under his breath and Stiles rolled his eyes. You’d think that after everything they did for him, Jackson would show a little humility. Apparently it was too much of a stretch to believe that Jackson could be anything but a rich jack-ass, even when believing that the supernatural was knocking on their door wasn’t that weird at all. 

“Hey.” 

“Shut up, Stilinski,” Jackson said, low and threatening, and Stiles’ teeth clacked together with how fast he shut up. Jackson folded his arms across his chest and sunk into the chair; on the stage the principal continued to talk. 

“It’s my vision that we can put this behind us, use their memory to keep us strong. We won’t forget, but we will not let that defeat us. We will stay strong.” On stage, Ms. Morell crossed her legs in her elegant skirt and was the only one of the teachers that looked bored instead of ‘so sincere it’s a bit like I’m desperately holding in a fart.’

Stiles phased out the rest by staring hard at the folds of the curtains. He didn’t want to hear the rest of it; remembering made his chest feel tight, like he couldn’t breathe. _Like he was drowning_. 

The assembly dispersed with a few more ‘feel good’ messages tossed out and at least one ‘God Bless America’ that was supposed to be comforting. Stiles’ skin itched. 

He was in his free period in the afternoon, heading to study hall when he found Jackson. Jackson was standing there looking paralyzed in front of the small shrine built to Matt. Stiles couldn’t find a name for that expression, somewhere between terrified and angry, eyes wide and cheeks flushed against the unnatural pale of his skin. Jackson’s freckles stood out so brightly Stiles could probably count them even at that distance. 

“Miss him?” Stiles called, his tone hard, aiming to sting, and Jackson flinched so hard it looked like it had to hurt. 

Jackson looked like a wounded animal for a moment, all hard eyes and lips pulled back from his teeth like a feral dog, before he reined it in. His eyes flashed ice blue so fast Stiles couldn’t be sure it actually happened before he settled into a scowl. “Leave me alone.” 

“Tough.” Stiles kept his distance just out of striking distance; of course Jackson was stronger now, faster, but Stiles was going to bet he was also on a tight leash. Jackson’s fists visibly balled at his sides, jaw tense. “I’m just looking out for the ‘safety of the school’,” he said, quoting the principal just to watch the way that Jackson both growled and shrank in on himself. 

He looked a lot like a dog that had attacked the police when they busted into this drug op (Stiles had been in the car watching, wide eyed as the thing growled and snarled, pulling himself into a corner. He could count its ribs through its thin fur, its body crossed with scars. It had to be put down. Stiles had really wanted to keep it. 

“I’m fine,” Jackson hissed. The school population couldn’t seem to decide if Jackson was a pariah or some sort of Lacrosse Jesus. Lydia was still flaunting her exile like she was some warrior queen of the badlands. Allison wasn’t even trying to make people like her again moving quietly from class to class like a ghost. “Derek made sure of that. So you can piss right off.”

Jackson spun away and left, visibly seething, and Stiles had to admit that maybe Jackson was handling this better than Scott did in the beginning. The memorial for Matt was small, a plaque with a photo of him smiling and a short message about his contribution to the year book and his love of photography. It made Stiles feel a little sick just looking at it. 

Claws dug into his shoulder and he was spun around forcefully. Stiles’ hands came up instantly, but they were batted away, and he feared for his life for a moment. Lydia was a vision, righteous fury like her flaming hair, some sort of angel--Michael or one of the other warrior ones (his knowledge of angels came from Supernatural, and _what_ it was research). He didn’t even register the sting until his face was pushed sideways and the slap rang out. Her fists bunched in his shirt, shaking him roughly while she got up in his face. It was like she had four arms for all the effect he had in trying to stop her. 

“What the _fuck_ was that?” She spat out, enunciating the curse like it was barbed, and Stiles flinched away from her, face stinging. He tripped over his feet and crashed into a row of lockers; the whole thing rattled with a dull sort of sound and Lydia followed him. “I thought you were better than that,” Lydia hissed like he had somehow hurt her instead, before she strode away leaving him confused in her wake. Stiles absently touched his cheek where the skin felt hot and her nails had dug in just for a second. 

“Well fuck,” Stiles said. 

“You said it.” Stiles managed not to jump out of his skin but it was a near thing. Isaac just smirked at him, he slapped his hand against the locker next to Stiles’ head, looming for a moment like the most menacing bean-stalk ever. Isaac has that way of smiling that was a threat and a promise all wrapped into one, like he was no stranger to casual violence. Like he was in a Tarintino flick and was about to splatter Stiles’ brains out in a spray of unrealistic gore. “I’d leave Jackson alone if I were you. His self-control isn’t the best and I’d hate for it to be you when he snaps and kills someone.” 

Isaac left him standing there trying to figure out why he’d come out the bad guy when Jackson was clearly the problem. (He’d _always_ been Stiles’ problem. Now he just had teeth.) 

Stiles tried hard to put it out of his mind for the rest of the day, just making it from hour to hour and trying to pretend that he could count on one hand how many supernatural creatures were in any given class with him. Both Lydia and Allison were in his study period, but Allison had looked up hopefully and Lydia just strode past her to an unoccupied corner and threw herself into something obviously not on the syllabus. 

“Well that was stressful,” Scott said as he swung himself up and into the Jeep, tossing his backpack into the back. Scott took a breath and held it for a moment before releasing it and going limp against the passenger seat. 

“Tell me about it. I have chemistry with Erica again.” Stiles sighed, Scott laughed. 

“Did she stop with the Elvira yet?” Scott asked with a quirking grin.

“Nope. Like vampire porno threw up all over her. I mean she looks good but --”

“I know.” Scott agreed, and Stiles turned the ignition. He half expected for Derek to show up because Derek was always there to rub his giant black penis extension of a car in their faces after school. Or just to freak them out when things were finally beginning to feel normal again. 

No, instead there was Isaac pressing a hand between Jackson’s shoulder-blades while Jackson pushed away from him. This far away Stiles couldn’t hear what they were talking about, but Scott sort of smiled at them so it must have been something amusing. Jackson slammed the door to the silver Porche and flipped Isaac off, cutting Stiles off, and then to finish the triad of being a dick, sped off, seriously endangering the student body and the front bumper of his pretty car.

“What do you want to do today?” Scott asked, watching Isaac walk away from the school towards the bus stop. He was oddly alone, neither Erica nor Boyd there to meet him. 

“The same thing we do every day.” Stiles set up. 

“Try to take over the world.” They both chimed as Scott chuckled and hit the radio. 

\--

It wasn’t quite presto-magic but after about a week and a half they seemed to have hit a new sort of ‘normal’. Derek was suspiciously quiet, hadn’t popped up behind him with a dire prediction in long enough that Stiles almost missed his scowl (only not, there wasn’t enough sarcasm in the whole world for that statement.)

Of all the people he expected to shatter the calm, it wasn’t Erica. Stiles probably shouldn’t have been surprised. Cat Woman was always there to throw a spanner into the works. Her jeans were hardly a cat suit, but they hugged the lines of her legs perfectly. She hadn’t been wrong--her everything _was_ beautiful. 

What he never understood was why she hadn’t put the effort into it before. It wasn’t like Derek took her bra shopping. Or maybe—but no, that was too horrifying to even contemplate. That was new and unseen levels of horror, that was like watching _It_ for the first time when you were eight and encountering a clown at a block party the next day level of trauma. The kind that of horror took effort. 

“What’s up pussy-cat?” He asked, trying to be casual and suave and not at all a little freaked out by the fact that she was a hot werewolf who used to like him of all people for some bizzaro-land reason. 

“Not much puppy-face,” she replied with that twist of her lips that could be mocking or it could be assessing, but it didn’t matter because not a lot of people were looking at her face anyway. Stiles only really saw it because he was staring so hard at just her face his eyes were feeling the strain. “I just wanted to talk.” 

“So talk,” he said and her expression did something complicated, twisting, and for a moment her facade slipped up. She looked unsure for a moment, mouth smoothing out of that infuriating smirk and brows softening so she just looked a little lost. 

“Not here.” She shrugged her shoulders. She leaned in close so her wild hair was almost everything he could see, blonde, very blonde, and she smelled good, fresh and fruity and very much in his face. Her breasts were pressing against his chest and he could hear the faint purr in her voice when she spoke against his ear. “So many attentive ears. Meet me during free period on the roof. I’ll leave the door open for you.” 

“And if this is a trap?” Stiles said, his voice coming out high and squeaky instead of the calm and collected he wanted it to be. She made a soft huffing sound out of her nose that tickled down the exposed line of his neck. 

“You’re not actually Batman,” she replied before pushing away from the lockers, strutting her way down the hall followed by the steady click of her shoes. 

Down the hall, Isaac looked up from his locker as if he wanted to come over and ask Stiles what that was all about. Stiles slammed his locker loudly, barely checked to make sure he locked it before he took off in the opposite direction that was a conversation he really didn’t want to have. He forgot the notebook he needed. 

He toyed with the idea of not showing up, but the very thought of what Erica might do to him if he didn’t show up had him going up the stairs before he could even really stop to think about what he was doing. 

Erica was sitting cross legged on the roof of the school. When she said she was going to leave it open what she meant was she was going to rip the door handle right off so it couldn’t lock at all anymore. Crude, but effective. 

“I feel like a spy,” Stiles called. She was dangling her legs over the end like they weren’t three stories up. Granted, she would probably survive the fall and walk away with only tears in her clothes but Stiles wouldn’t, and so he stayed away from the edge, just watching Erica. 

“Most of the time you just forget that they can hear you all the time,” Erica said loud enough for Stiles to hear her from across the roof. There wasn’t any wind, just the sun making her hair seem pale as spun gold and burning where it landed on Stiles’ bare arms. “It’s weird.” Erica shrugged. They had seemed pretty cozy in their werewolf commune as far as Stiles could tell. Clearly something must have changed. 

“Just a warning.” When she spoke again it was flat and expressionless. Erica didn’t look at him, just shook out her hair and sent the light scattering around her. “Things are coming, everything is changing still. Keep your nose out of this, Stiles, humans don’t have a place here.” 

He wanted to point out that he never had a place in this, always the third wheel and the thumb slotted in with all the fingers. Instead he was quiet. It seemed like she was honestly just trying to help, not even trying to hide that it with a threat. Of course Stiles was going to ignore her; whatever Scott was mixed up in meant that he was going to be there too. Human or not, they were a team. They were Sherlock Holmes and John Watson, cookies and cream. 

“Thanks but no thanks,” Stiles said and she laughed, a low and husky sound. 

“I thought you might say that.” 

Stiles left her sitting on the roof, slipping down the steps. He probably should have tried to get more details out of her about what was going on and how she knew. Some of the old panic welled up at the thought of having to deal with anything else because how much worse could it get? The Kanima had been the boss battle, everything should be better now. Stiles paused, closed his eyes and took a deep breath, focusing on the steady thump of his heart. 

Whatever was coming, they would deal with that too. After all, once you got enough EXP you always levelled up and that meant that you were ready for the next monsters. He didn’t actually believe that but it was repeat it to himself or go insane. 

Despite his misgivings, nothing popped out of the darkness; there were no more dire pronouncements over the next few days. In fact there was nothing of interest at all, unless you counted the fact that Isaac and Boyd got in a vicious and obvious fight on the field after school. They had been surrounded by cheering students who had no idea how much danger they were in when Scott leapt between them, yelling to break things up. Everyone managed to get away before the teachers managed to get wind of the excitement and run over. Isaac snarled and snapped his teeth at Stiles as he passed. His face was already bruising but it wouldn’t last for long. Still, Boyd had always been so calm, Stiles was more shaken than he would like to admit by the fight. 

“You are to stay in and mind the curfew,” Dad yelled up the stairs. Thursday nights he had a later shift so they had dinner early. Stiles was actually a pretty good cook; Dad would do the dishes before he went to get dressed to go out and fight crime like a Batman who wore Khaki. (Why was Stiles always Robin? It was frustrating, except he suspected strongly that he didn’t have the pure balls needed to be the main character.) “I mean it young man.” 

“I know Dad,” Stiles called back, trying not to whine. Break the curfew once, twice, thrice ... frice , and they never let you live it down. It wasn’t like he was a pathological liar--only when he needed to be. Besides he was on his best behaviour this year. 

“And do your homework,” his Dad called, heavy tread bringing him up the stairs to Stiles’ room. 

“Oh my god. I know Dad,” Stiles yelled back through the open door of his bedroom. 

“Hey.” His dad poked his head in the door, quirking his lips, all dressed and ready to go. “I love you.”

“I love you to Dad,” Stiles replied and his dad was gone again, just as fast moving towards his own bedroom. Lately he’d been saying that a lot more; maybe it was the scare at the police station, but they had both already learned that you never knew when a day with someone you love could be the last, so this was something else entirely. 

Then Dad was gone, the crunch of his tires on the drive-way, and Stiles was alone with his homework for the night. Right, homework. 

Stiles tossed the piles of textbooks on the bed. One night without pre-calc wasn’t going to spell his doom and inevitable job with McDonald’s, no matter what his father said. Stiles was 90% sure that was a lie--not 100% and that was a little worrying, but he’d been so good at school. Well, he’d been good. Also, he was a teen-aged boy and was horny almost all the time. “It’s just you and me babe,” Stiles said affectionately to his computer.

Seriously, it would be a problem if the Internet wasn’t full of free porn. Oodles and oodles of it: the whole gambit from lesbians to twinks to things involving body-sized animal costumes out of Japan. Bless freaky Japanese porn. Stiles opened a private browsing section and began to dig through tumblr sites he had secretly saved. 

Boobs. Boobs were great. Stiles watched the pictures scroll by looking for video links; there were a few but he also got bored easily. Bouncing was good, bouncing for ten minutes straight? He needed something more immediate, some sort of stimulation. A lot of kink was just the same thing, but in latex, and that wasn’t his thing. He could only do this when he was sure that Dad was going to be gone because it was the slap of hand or crop on skin or the yelp of pain that made it. 

He cued up an interesting one and wiggled out of his jeans. 

There was a small, small part of him that figured he should probably be ashamed, to feel like a deviant, but he watched Ellen and knew labels were bad. Also, compared to the rest of things that he had to deal with, liking ‘spanking the monkey’ as a more literal term wasn’t all that huge. A little perspective went a long way.

The girl was speaking to the camera man, admitting that yes this was what she liked, what her fantasies were and how much she was looking forward to the scene. These things were called scenes; he was all hip with the lingo. 

She wore nothing but some rope wrapped around her chest, making her boobs budge and pop unnaturally, wrists tied in front of her and up attached to the ceiling. Another lady in thigh high boots and black lingerie walked around in spiky heels. 

Why was it always women in this kind of porn? The stuff he found for men was all leather and fisting (which, what the shit?-- **ow** ). 

The woman being spanked yelped, twisting sharply away as the domme slapped at one of her bound breasts. Stiles had started off innocuously enough, found he liked porn that was a little more rough because it would be so much harder to fake a reaction like that. It went a little deeper than _pump pump cum, who’s a naughty school girl?_

Despite being totally okay with his dirty secrets and deviance, he could feel his face heat. 

Stiles managed to put off touching himself for all of three minutes into the film. The girl was being slapped around, high whines and small moans giving her away. He couldn’t say if he really wanted to be the one hitting or the one being hit. It was all about the power exchange, of giving in willingly. Or at least that was what he told himself to rationalize his spank bank as some sort of experiment in human nature. 

He cupped his balls, testing out the familiar heft of them, the crinkly paper-thin skin there with just the tips of his fingers. On screen, the lady was whipping the girl with something made of many strips of leather; it didn’t have the same crack as her hand or the crop did, but it did make the skin pink up instantly and the bound girl writhe and moan. He just wished that the camera would focus more on the Domme, on the satisfaction she must get from orchestrating the whole thing. 

Stiles also sort of wished she had red hair. He could imagine Lydia swinging her hips as he strode around on those stiletto boots, laced up the calves like she could cut you through with the sharp edge. She would have no problem controlling someone, smiling like a cat with a mouse. In this fantasy, she would wring orgasm after orgasm out of him, or sometimes she would have one of those strap-ons and because this was a fantasy, it was huge as fuck and she would fuck Jackson with it while Stiles watched and panted and wanted to shove his fingers in Jackson’s mouth until he choked, or get on his knees and beg and beg for something. 

Stiles jerked up into his fist, wet with his own spit and watched the way the bound girl hissed and shouted when the domme slapped her inner thighs with the whip-thing. He fucked up into his own hand, watching the screen and letting snippets of fantasy play out over the scene. 

Scott and that stupid bowl that Stiles had thought was a good idea, kneeling naked on the floor lapping it up with a clumsy tongue. Not that Scott would ever agree to that, but Scott was fit and hot and Stiles knew what Scott’s hand around Stiles’ dick felt like so it was like a safe fantasy. He came with a muted sound when the domme had shoved her fingers between the girl’s legs and forced her to come hard, twisting and yelling like it was too much. 

‘I told you not to cum until I said so, you little slut.’ 

Stiles slumped back against his computer-chair, balling up the tissue he’d used to avoid making a mess and tossing it in trash with all the other offerings to the fertility goddess. It was entirely internet porn’s fault he had to empty his own garbage because there wasn’t a single thought more mortifying than his dad doing it. 

In the background, the domme said “don’t cum”, even as her hands moved wicked and wet between her partner’s thighs, speakers making the other woman’s cries echo around him, sobbing as she took it. 

Finished, Stiles closed the browser. He’d be back for that one either later tonight or some other night. 

Stiles was seriously contemplating shutting down WoW for actual calculus (still plagued by guilt, guilt and a side dish of fucking _guilt_ ) when Scott slipped in through his window like a cat burglar. His eyes glowed golden in the low lights Stiles used when he was using his computer. 

Scott looked at him, took a visible sniff of the air and gave him a grin that was somewhere between sly and dopy. Stiles rolled his eyes and crossed his arms. 

“What was so important you couldn’t just call me?” Technically there was still a curfew on. 

Scott’s expression melted from haphazard teenager to that newer pinched look of responsibility he was trying on. Stiles wasn’t really sure what he thought about that; his whole life there had been points where he seriously worried for Scott’s brain, but in spite of everything he seemed to be giving it his all and inexplicably not doing half bad. If he was honest, he hated it. Before all this, there hadn’t been a single thing that made Scott remarkable and they had only needed each other. 

“Derek dropped by.” Code for, Derek was lurking in my room in the dark. 

“Doom and gloom time?” 

“Adventure time” Scott cracked a smile. “Something is up in the woods. Werewolf things. Allison might be there.” Scott looked pathetically hopeful about that. 

“And her crazy werewolf hunting Dad,” Stiles pointed out, but it didn’t faze Scott’s enthusiasm at all. “Whatever, let me grab a sweater. Dad isn’t home. I’m not climbing out the window unless I need to.”

It was less than spy-like to just walk out the front door and close it behind him. Together they took off into the woods that were never far from their corner of suburbia, sprawling and dark like a threat. 

Scott seemed to be following a trail that only he could see, pausing softly every now and then to change their direction. 

“Wanna fill me in?” Stiles asked and Scott cocked his head like he was listening, but then they started walking again. 

“That fight between Boyd and Isaac, something happened to Boyd and Erica but I don’t know what-- they were drawing out Isaac. I overheard them, but Derek was concerned when Isaac didn’t come back.”

“What does this have to do with us?” Stiles sighed, picking his way through the underbrush carefully, trying not to make too much noise, but that was so far beyond a lost cause. He settled for not tripping over a root and twisting his ankle like a cheerleader in a horror film. 

Scott gave him that sad puppy dog face. Stiles felt like a bit of a heel but someone needed to be sensible. Whatever Isaac was up to was seriously none of their business. Erica had warned him to keep out of it and he really wanted to keep out, but only if it meant that Scott would too, because he couldn’t very well leave Scott’s back unwatched. 

“Isaac is a friend. I want to make sure he is okay,” Scott said, giving him those huge eyes. Stiles rolled his eyes so hard he felt like he was going to strain something. Had to stop from reminding Scott about how violence simmered just under Isaac’s floppy smile. 

“He’s got Derek,” Stiles reasoned. 

Scott gave him a patient look. “You trust Derek?” 

Well no. 

That seemed like enough discussion; they continued to walk. Scott stopped again, ticked his head to the side and turned to their left. “Come out,” he called. 

Jackson melted out of the night looking surly. “Derek is this way,” he said, rolling his shoulders. He was only wearing a tight sweater against the coolness of the night. It seemed at least someone was immune to the lure of the leather. 

“Looks like the whole gang is here,” Stiles said needlessly. 

“Hurrah,” Jackson replied with more sarcasm than any one person should have been able to fit into a single word. Colour him impressed, it takes a master to know one. Scott didn’t seem to be overly bothered by Jackson’s sass just followed him into the night. 

Derek was squatting near a fallen log and Peter was leaning against a tree, both of their leather jackets catching the moonlight like they were supposed to be characters out of a cheesy television drama. Derek was staring at them before they could see him. 

“They took him,” Derek said simply. “The alpha pack.” 

“Bait,” Peter added helpfully, he gave a little finger-wiggle of a wave. “It’s a trap and we’re going to walk into it.” 

“Well that’s kinda dumb,” Stiles pointed out and Jackson scoffed. 

Derek growled at them and Peter shrugged. “It’s the only way to get Isaac back.” 

“Erica? Boyd?” Scott added softly and Derek shook his head looking even more murderous than usual. 

“They made their choices,” he snarled and Stiles was going to keep well out of that one. 

“ _O_ \--kay,” Stiles replied, turning to Peter and hoping against hope he would be the more responsible one--which was funny because he was a sociopath and a murderer and had kidnapped Stiles once too. So there was that. 

“Well let’s go.” 

The thing was, these things happened so fast and Stiles was always so scared that they became sort of flashes in his memory. His mind shut down to protect his delicate undersides. The slide of shadows melting into fur, the particular way that enamel caught the light making muzzles flash like gunfire. Every bit as dangerous. 

The forest was alight with howls, his fail-boat human ears couldn’t tell them apart; he just knew that they were everywhere. At one point he was lost, standing between the trees all alone and knew that the trees crawled with danger. 

Out of nowhere, Jackson flew out like he’d been burned and crashed into Stiles. They went down together, carried by Jackson’s momentum, they were horribly and hopelessly tangled together. Jackson was crushing him, trying too hard to get up, and Stiles growled something wordless. Suddenly Jackson froze and Stiles with him. 

Jackson was panting against his neck, too-warm against Stiles side. He also smelled like blood and dirt, sticky where they were touching. 

Stiles got them into the hollow of one of the trees. Jackson plastered to his side, refusing to make a sound. Something was moving near-by making enough sound that it wanted them to know it was coming. 

Jackson was tensed so tight he felt like he was made of stone and Stiles pulled him closer, use him as a human shield maybe. Another crash, closer this time. 

“Come out puppy,” someone said low and menacing, singing the words. Jackson flinched and Stiles pressed his fingers the back of his neck, trying to keep him quiet. “I know you’re around here. I can smell you. Come on out, you were a cute one.”

Stiles felt his blood go cold; they were getting closer and closer. Jackson wasn’t much help, hiding with him instead of being all bad ass werewolf. 

“I’ll even kill you quickly.” 

Closer still. 

Jackson remained stubbornly human. Stiles was beginning to really panic. His heart was going to give them away, beating so loud that it was trying to jump right out of his chest. 

“If we do this the hard way I am going to make you scream.” 

A roar cut through the night, closer than before and Jackson jerked hard, whining high in his throat and clawing at the back of his neck where Stiles’ fingers were. He felt the ragged lines of heat as Jackson clawed at him, too tangled to get properly away from him in time. 

“Derek,” Jackson hissed under his breath, trying to pull himself away from Stiles. In the light he could see that Jackson was covered in blood, face and shirt coated with it where the shirt was barely holding together from being torn. 

Another roar and Jackson curled up in a ball. 

Jackson’s scream pierced the night, it shivered and shuddered half way through, ending in a pained snarl.  
Stiles forgot to worry about the wolf hunting them when set face to face with Jackson-as-a-werewolf. 

Stiles had a moment where he was sure that Jackson was going to turn on him and rip him to so many pieces, but Jackson just gave him a sad look, his blue eyes were luminous in the darkness. He dropped to a crouch and took off into the darkness. A moment later a second shape chased after him, claws spraying dirt as it sprinted in the direction Jackson went in. 

“Shit.” Stiles swore, pulling himself out of their hiding spot and scrambling to his feet, chasing after Jackson. 

The alpha was huge. Bigger even than Peter had been, eyes glowing the same bright red, covered in fur. It reminded him of that night, where he’d thrown the bomb and nothing happened, Jackson beside him, so scared that Stiles could smell the bright fear on him, could see the whites of his eyes. Still Jackson’s aim had been true.

The roar had been Derek; he was circling it, growling. Jackson was there too, still all furry and toothy, snarling at it from the side-lines so much like the gathering of students around the fight on the field. 

Stiles skidded to a stop right on the edge of the clearing. The alpha turned to look at him, eyes glowing like something out of a haunted house ride at the carnival, almost tacky. 

Derek used the pause to launch himself at it. 

After that it was too hard for him to keep up, the alpha and Derek rolled across the forest floor, trying to rip at each other’s throats with teeth and claws. Jackson circled them, making this high sort of whining sound.

Isaac leapt into the fight, literally flying out from between the trees with Scott just behind him. 

Finding itself suddenly outnumbered, the alpha vanished into the night and Derek howled a furious sound that raised the hairs on even Stiles’ arms. Stiles watched with interest as Jackson went shock still. It didn’t seem to affect the others that way. Scott stood back, searching out Stiles with his eyes and breaking out into a smile when he found Stiles there clinging to a tree and trying not to be sick everywhere. 

Derek shifted back into a normal human. His face was scuffed up, as were his clothes. Isaac didn’t look so bad off for being held captive, just covered in leaves like he had been rolling around in them. Jackson was a mess, covered in blood and filth his sweater was more stain than cotton by this point. 

Jackson backed up a few steps when Derek moved towards him, touching Isaac’s shoulder softly and if Stiles hadn’t seen it he may not have believed it--was that affection and worry from the emotionally stunted alpha male archetype? There was a rustle and Scott looked up. Suddenly Peter was also there with them, looking a little ruffled with leaves caught in his hair, but more or less unharmed. 

“We’ll talk later,” Derek growled at Jackson. 

Jackson made a rude sound but only after Derek was out of striking distance. 

“Well that was fun,” Stiles said loudly and obviously, only because if he had to put up with any more awkward silence he was going to go insane. Awkward silences were only good when he was the one who made them. Isaac snorted and Peter arched an expressive eyebrow at him. “What the hell was that anyways?” 

“A test,” Derek growled. 

“Just feeling us out,” Peter explained. “The werewolf equivalent of bringing a pie to the new neighbours.” 

“I think I would have preferred the pie,” Isaac mumbled and Peter gave him an indulgent look. Pie would have been better than terror and darkness and that sweeping sensation that something was coming and he wasn’t going to be able to stop it. _Really_ would have preferred pie. 

“That means this is only the beginning?” Scott asked and Peter rolled his eyes managing to look ‘too old to deal with your shit’ which was an expression he had learned from Scott’s mom lately. 

“It looks that way.” 

“We’ll deal with it,” Derek grunted, because they had a great track record of dealing with things so well. If by dealing, Derek meant ‘blood and horror and death’ then yeah they were going to be fucking _peachy_. 

“Should we follow them?” Isaac asked. Stiles really wanted them to say no. 

“I followed them for a bit but they gave me the slip,” Peter replied with a rueful little smile; Derek gave him an uneasy look that did nothing for Stiles’ faith in their ability to ‘deal with it’. 

Derek made a disgusted sound and sort of melted into the shadows, which should have been impossible because the sky was full of stars, but worked all the same. One moment he was there and the next he was just gone. “Off to have a sulk I guess.” Peter hummed to himself before pulling much the same trick. 

“Are you okay?” Scott asked and Isaac rolled his shoulders. 

“Been through worse,” was all Isaac said and Jackson made a snorting sound. “Problem?” Isaac asked fisting what was left of Jackson’s shit and shaking him. Jackson snapped his teeth at him but didn’t fight back. 

“Let’s just go.” Scott sighed, looking up at the sky like he could tell the time that way. (Being a werewolf in no way made him an outdoor’s man--without the GPS on his phone Scott would got lost in malls.) 

With Stiles they had to go the slightly longer way, walking like normal humans instead of the weird loping run that Scott favoured. The one that made him look like a charging gorilla. 

“So this is great,” Stiles said out loud, unsurprised when he was ignored. “I mean things were just settling back down to normal and now we’ve got something else to deal with. Like pre-calc wasn’t enough to deal with.”

Again he was ignored. Only Jackson was in his pre-calc class, but he’d been quiet lately. Not content with his social out-cast status but not really trying to do anything about it. 

“Can you not get blood on my car?” Stiles asked when they were standing outside of the Jeep. Jackson gave him a disgusted look; most of it had dried to a rusty brown, flaking at the edges. The more open wounds had begun to heal already, smooth skin flashing under what was left of his clothes and what wasn’t stuck to his skin. 

“It’s not like anything could make it worse.” Jackson said back looking down his nose at Stiles standing defensively in front of his baby. 

“We can’t all drive Porches,” Stiles bit back as Isaac crawled into the back, shoving Jackson ahead of him until they were settled. 

“Werewolf taxi service.” Scott grinned at him as he leapt up and into the car, forgetting to even act normal when there wasn’t anyone else around to see them. 

“Fuck. You.” Stiles huffed.

Jackson ended up back at Stiles’ place after they drove by and saw all the lights on at Jackson’s house. Under all the dirt and blood he would have said Jackson was pale, but it was hard to tell. He couldn’t help but think he was being judged and found wanting by the gaze that Jackson scanned over his house. Which wasn’t all that different from normal, but rubbed him the wrong way all the same. 

“You’ll heal right?” Stiles asked. In the light, the damage to Jackson’s face was worse than he thought--what he’d assumed was dirt was actually bruising. He looked like he’d gone one on one with something huge. It might have made him a bad person but Stiles sort of liked the look on him. If there was a person who deserved to be taken down, it was Jackson. 

“Of course,” Jackson bit out, arms crossed defensively in front of him and looking oddly out of place in Stiles’ living room. 

“Bathroom is upstairs.” 

Jackson didn’t thank him, just left. 

It wasn’t until the water turned on that Stiles realized he’d forgotten to give him towels. He rushed upstairs, grabbed a few, waffled outside of the door and thought about the fact that Jackson was a werewolf now and probably could hear him standing outside of the bathroom like a creeper peeping on a PYT. 

He knocked and shoved the door open. They had lacrosse practice together and Jackson had a weird thing about being naked in the change room, like he needed to prove that it didn’t bother him that Danny could ogle his junk like it bothered some of the other players. Thus Stiles could imagine the sleek lines of his body through the frosted glass of the shower, knew that Jackson had freckles on his shoulders and was a long lean line of muscle. He looked a lot like the type of guys in gay porn, groomed and sleek, not a twink, but without an inch of fat.

“Towels,” Stiles mumbled and tossed them on the closed toilet seat. Jackson didn’t respond. 

Stiles felt vindictively satisfied when Jackson was wearing that hideous orange and blue striped polo that his aunt had given him last Christmas. It didn’t quite fit Jackson right either, and he made much the same face that Derek did, but without the undercurrent of imminent violence. 

“Where did you even get anything so ugly?” Jackson said, tugging at the hem. He was tighter around the waist and smaller around the shoulders than Stiles was, something he’d never really noticed before because Jackson always wore clothes that fit him perfectly and looked like he walked out of a catalogue for ‘clothes for douche-bags’. 

“It takes effort.” Stiles smirked and Jackson tugged at the hem some more. He was wearing a pair of sweats that Stiles had lying around too while the washing machine ran. Hopefully the blood was wet enough that it would all come out. The bruises on his face were all but healed already, sickly yellow around his eyes and across the sharp cut of his cheek bones. 

“I look homeless,” Jackson spat like an angry cat. 

“Yep,” Stiles replied far too cheerfully. Even if he didn’t take a picture he was going to remember this moment. 

The next day, Stiles caught Jackson in front of the small shrine to Matt again. He was just standing there, staring at the glass like he wasn’t even looking at it. He’d passed Erica in the hall and whatever hit her had hit her hard enough he could still see the faint outline of bruises the next day. Still, she held her head high and didn’t say anything, shaking out her long hair and ignoring it. She was obviously mixed up in all of this somehow but he wasn’t going to get anything out of her; if he wanted level-headed answers he would need to pin down Boyd. Of course, Boyd had been dodging just about everyone since the fight with Isaac and was not making it easy. 

Also there was a test coming up this Friday. 

He paused, looked around to make sure that Lydia wasn’t lurking anywhere ready to defend Jackson’s honour before he walked up to him. “What are you looking at?” 

The soft tone must have done it because Jackson just blinked, touching the glass and smudging fingerprints along it. “I dream about the kanima and I can’t get drunk anymore.” 

Anyone who had never seen the way that Jackson tossed back his flask or seen the sheer amount of gore that the kanima left in its wake wouldn’t have understood the connection between those two statements. Stiles didn’t think of anything to say fast enough, nothing in his head seemed fitting, and he didn’t know how to talk to Jackson in anything other than hostility or sarcasm. “Finally got what you wanted and it’s not working out for you?” He hadn’t meant it to be cruel, it just came out that way. 

“What do you care?” Jackson just blinked at him, the edges of his smile sharp and volatile. Vividly he remembered the discussion about who was there to care for Jackson? He wasn’t with Lydia any more. 

“Who else is going to?” Stiles said before he could really think about it. 

Jackson glared at him sharply, teeth bared like he was going to attack. 

Instead he just spun on his feet and left. Oh, Stiles should have left it at that. Jackson wasn’t his responsibility and he had enough of that with Scott and his soap opera and Lydia and whatever was going on with her. Instead he chased after Jackson. 

“What do you want?” Jackson hissed at him. They found an empty classroom that Jackson ducked into. The chalkboard was filled with Spanish and the sun streamed into the room, making Jackson’s hair glow and the freckles across his cheeks stand out against the dark circles under his eyes.

Stiles didn’t know what he wanted. To make sure that Jackson wasn’t going to go postal and slaughter the school? Apologize for the way his mouth ran without any input from his brain? To mock him about that sneaky photo he took of Jackson wearing his clothes? To admit that he jerked off to the photo of Jackson wearing his clothes? “Are you okay?” was what came out of his mouth. 

Jackson looked at him and just started laughing; it was a cruel laugh, mocking and imperious and all the things that Jackson was before all of this went down. Everything that made Stiles hate him because he had everything that Stiles could have ever wanted. Money, status, _Lydia_. “I’m perfect. Stronger, faster and better,” Jackson said finally, lying through his teeth. Stiles didn’t need to be a werewolf to figure that one out. “Now leave me alone before I rip you apart.” 

It lacked the same heat that it had when Isaac or Derek was threatening him, so Stiles grabbed at Jackson’s hands fully expecting to get punched, but Jackson just shoved at him with his shoulder and attempted to escape again. 

Well that could have gone better, and at the same time that could have gone a lot worse.

\--

 

(It took him three days and a lot of stalking to finally get Boyd one on one. Boyd hadn't wanted to share with him, but Stiles was nothing if not persistent, dedicated, and extremely irritating when he wanted to be.

 _'Derek isn't the only Big Bad around,'_ Boyd said, his voice low and almost scared. _'These new guys, they are cold, hard. They'd hurt my family—Derek isn't worth that.'_

Stiles pestered him some more.

' _It's like this: they want the alpha, Derek doesn't want to go, so they are going to kill off the betas one by one until he's weak. Isaac, Peter, Jackson, Scott—all of them. Either me or Erica is going to kill Derek to inherit his power; the one that loses dies. Huff and puff and blow us all down, get it?'_

It was all a little too Highlander for Stiles' tastes, what with all the there-can-be-only-one bullshit.)

Scott and Allison were playing an elaborate game of tag. Lydia was either the referee or the defence—Stiles wasn't sure, he didn’t know if there was a way to be sure. Did tag even have defensive players? Maybe it was more a game of dodge ball.

Stiles also wasn't sure what team Stiles was on. He walked up to Scott three times only to be glared at and hissed at to go away, that his timing was all wrong. He was beginning to think he was actually on Allison's team without even knowing it.

Which meant he was sitting on the bleachers alone during lunch, watching people meandering around the field and feeling a little envious about people with normal lives. After all, most of those people down there, werewolves did not out-weigh humans in their phone contacts. Allison and Scott's romance had gone from a comedy to a tragedy faster than you could say Shakespeare. A real tragedy where e everyone ended up dead, not like the usual teenaged ‘he hates me and my life is totally _over_ ’ kind. 

Also, he needed to think of a way to keep Scott from getting tangled up with the Alpha pack.

Post-script, he needed to stop jerking off to that photo of Jackson wearing his clothes. That was just sick. He was sick.

Peter was lurking at the edges of the bleachers watching him. Stiles thought about ignoring him for all of a minute. "You can get arrested for lurking around kids you know," Stiles said while Peter just grinned at him sharp and unforgiving.

"I'm dead." He shrugged. "Not a lot to worry about."

"Except the Alphas that want to kill you," Stiles replied, letting his sarcasm speak for him.

"Well, there is that," Peter agreed, "but I knew that. Nice to hear what Boyd had to say about it."

"Of course you were listening." Stiles didn't know why he was surprised, he _knew_ Peter was skeevy like a snake. It wasn't like Peter used Lydia to poison them or anything. He was only a little bitter about that, really.

"You would have made a good werewolf." Peter said and Stiles' thoughts skidded to a halt and changed direction.

"Well, why didn't you?" Stiles asked waspishly. It wasn't like he was jealous; it had ruined almost everyone's lives. Something about Peter just made him feel really petty. 

"At the time? Because you would have interfered with Lydia." Stiles blinked. It had taken so much will to say no then, only to find out he never had a choice at all. "You could have been an Alpha yourself. Scott is strong but he's not ruthless. Not like you."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Stiles said flatly.

"Of course you don't." Peter shrugged. "The ridiculous self-esteem issues of teenagers is none of my concern. Trust me, it's enough being around Isaac and Jackson."

"So what, you're here to bite me?"

"I can't turn you anymore." Peter shrugged.

"Tell me to keep out of it for being human?" Stiles tried.

Peter just gave him that infuriating smile. "Why would I do a thing like that? You do motivate Scott with your precious frailty."

"Gee, thanks," Stiles bitched, "you give me all the warm fuzzies. So what do you want?"

"Just checking up. Can't be too careful—look both ways crossing the road and all that. They will offer to change you and if you refuse they will kill you. Wolf hunting strategy: pick the weakest one and wear it down."

Great. Because Stiles didn't have enough shit to deal with.

"I'd hate for that to be you." Peter smiled, all teeth and no sincerity.

"R _i_ ght." Stiles drew out the vowel sign to adequately express his disdain, even then he wasn’t sure he quite managed to convey how very much he did not need Peter sticking his head where it wasn’t wanted.

Peter just gave him an infuriating look before he sauntered away, which, yeah, at least it was a step up from the usual melt into the shadows routine, but was still highly irritating.

"He's always like that," Jackson said softly from where he was lurking just on the other side of the bleachers. Stiles hadn't noticed him, but it would have been impossible for Peter to have missed him. "I think Derek is going to kill him," Jackson paused thoughtfully, "again."

"Thanksgiving dinner must be a nightmare," Stiles added helpfully. Jackson choked on a sound that may have been a laugh if he were the type of person to lower himself to laugh at a joke that someone like Stiles made.

"What are you doing out here?" Stiles asked. Last he checked the cool-kids table was still a thing, even if the population had dwindled a little.

"Just wanted to get away. Smelled Hale."

"Well, you did a pretty poor job of it," Stiles said, looking around the field. They were barely out of the view of everyone. Jackson snorted, not amused. "Let's go somewhere else," Stiles blurted out before he could think about what his mouth was going to do. He wanted to get away from Peter’s words, physical distance between them if he could. 

Jackson gave him an odd look.

"I mean, you wanted to get away, right? Let's just go. Me. You. I don't know, bowling or something." The odd look hadn't left his face, but at least he looked more bemused than hostile. Predictably, Stiles continued to babble. "I realize that everything has been a little weird lately, but run with the weird. _Be_ the weird. You and me weird."

"Sure."

"What?" Stiles stared at him, waiting for the insult, the cutting twist to his words.

Well, now he needed to think of somewhere to actually bring Jackson.

They couldn't go anywhere in town because Stiles didn't want to be caught by anyone. He didn't know all the new police officers yet. So they ended up in the woods because in Beacon Hills that was the place to be if you were a teenager without anything else to do.

"I killed a man over there." Jackson said almost conversationally. Stiles choked on air. "Matt wanted him dead." Beacon Hills was small enough that Jackson couldn't go anywhere without running into the remains of a crime scene. Jackson spoke matter-of-factly, the same way he used to answer questions in class—like it didn't really matter to him.

Stiles was beginning to think he paid a little too much attention to Jackson. (Hard not to when everything he did screamed 'look at me' and Stiles was easily distracted by shiny things.)

"Do you remember a lot about the Kanima?"

"I have a scrap book."

" _What?_."

"All the newspaper articles. Made the back pages of the New York Times." Jackson let out a soft sound, almost like a laugh but not quite. That was either vain, sad, or twisted; Stiles couldn't be sure which. Not that Jackson wasn't all three. "What I remember most is a sense of belonging. The Kanima was happy when it was being controlled."

"That's sick."

"I know," Jackson said lightly.

There wasn't anything he could really say in response to that, and the only thing that came to mind was, 'So, weird weather lately. Am I right?' Which seemed horribly inadequate next to everything else.

"Maybe you should take up collecting coins instead. Or maybe knitting. Have you tried knitting?" Stiles said with all the semi-hysterical sincerity he could gather, because it may have just hit him that he was having a heart-to-heart with Jackson-fucking-Whittmore in the middle of the forest, and he was emotionally incapable of dealing with it.

There was fucked up, and there was _fucked up_ , and anyone could see which camp Jackson was in.

Jackson stared at him and then he laughed. Not sarcastic laughing. No—honest, actual laughing, or maybe sobbing. Probably not sobbing, because Jackson was flushed but his face was dry.

"People think I'm insane," Jackson said, giving him a shadow of a smirk.

"No, people think you're the second coming of Jesus," Stiles said, and Jackson gave him a weird sort of look. "Well, you did sort of die. Twice."

"I guess there is that." Jackson tilted his head back; the Jeep looked too cheap to hold him. All wrapped up in expensive fabric, with perfectly done nails and hair, compared to Stiles who rolled out of bed, glared at himself in the mirrors, and wore something mostly clean. The sense of disconnect was almost as stressful as the fact that he knew he was going to fuck this up somehow. Say the wrong thing, do the wrong thing.

They lapsed into that awkward sort of silence again—the one where Stiles was trying too hard to not say something stupid to even notice what Jackson was doing.

"I figured you'd be the last person trying to help me," Jackson mumbled, mostly to himself, and this really was 'sharing is caring hour.' Maybe Jackson was having a psychotic break.

"Scott has been trying to help from the beginning," Stiles defended. He'd actually been all for killing Jackson, would have gladly done it himself after Jackson got his dad fired. Jackson probably didn't need to know that.

"Well, Scott is an idiot."

"Hey," Stiles snapped. He agreed most of the time, but it was the principle of the thing—the Bro Code. "That was uncalled for."

"And now?" Jackson gave him an odd look as he drew the words out between his teeth.

"You're one of the Scooby Gang now." Stiles shrugged. "Like it or not."

Jackson scoffed. "As if."

They played a weird sort of game of tag through the woods. Jackson never slipped the way Scott did, turning into a wolf despite his promises to play mano-a-mano. Stiles was breathing hard and fast, filled with a fierce sort of joy that made his heart beat fast. Or maybe that was the way he had been running just five minutes ago, Jackson to his left, the two of them dodging around trees and roots.

Somewhere above, a squirrel screamed, its cries loud and piercing, and something moved to his left. Stiles took off, startling Jackson, and Jackson tackled him to the floor, startling a laugh out of the other man.

"You're it," Stiles snarled, shoving off Jackson and taking off in the other direction.

It would have been weird to call it playing but he couldn't really think of another word for it. Jackson had been in peak shape before the whole werewolf thing; now he was perfect _and_ made it look effortless.

Stiles went home feeling sort of like we was the _boss_ , seriously.

They went on three more play-dates. There was something too weird about bringing Jackson back to his house, so they went for ice cream once, followed the entire way by Jackson's almost insulting, disbelieving silence.

Still, no one could deny banana splits. Also, now that he was actually talking, Stiles was hit with the stunning revelation that Jackson was painfully easy to bully into things. He bitched and he moaned and he actually called Stiles every name in the book, but in the end he always folded like a house of cards. Words were just that with Jackson. 

It was interesting in a desperate, 'don't-think-about-Lydia' kind of way.

That was when Jackson kissed him. Not that he would admit it (he was far more likely to admit that he had mad game), but he hadn't even realized that these quasi-dates were even sort of date-things. The thought that Jackson would have been even a little interested in him was about the same as there being aliens. Body-snatcher type aliens, since Stiles firmly believed that humans could not be alone in any logical galaxy.

"What?" Stiles asked, voice gone all high pitched and breathy with his confusion as Jackson pushed into his space like a cat seeking warmth. His mouth was lush, the kind of thing fantasies were made of, and there wasn't a coherent argument against it so he gave in, kissing Jackson back with all the stupefied lust he could manage.

It was a clumsy attempt but he was scoring points for enthusiasm.

Jackson broke the kiss, suspended awkwardly between the two seats of the Jeep. Now all they needed was an old fashioned drive-in.

"Wait. What?" Stiles asked again, because that was a thought that needed italics and underscoring, twice.

Jackson just gave him a look like he was stupid. There was a point to be conceded in Jackson's favour because Stiles would have to be, like, n00b-level-idiotic to question the fact that someone as attractive as Jackson was willing to sleep with him.

"Never mind, keep doing that," Stiles said in one breath. Jackson just sort of quirked his lips.

It was awkward with the stick shift between them but Stiles was determined to make it work. Jackson was pulling and tugging at him, hands roaming across his cheeks, down his neck and across his shoulders almost desperately. It was a little disconcerting how much Jackson seemed to want to the contact.

He'd gotten as far as hand jobs with a girl named Emerald before—she had worn lace panties with a special-made pouch to hold her dick, and Stiles hadn't even known those existed. Apparently there was a lot about cross-dressing he didn't know. Still, she (she was young but convinced that, when she could get the money together, she wanted the operation, and while there was a small part of him that went 'okay—weird' he could at least support her decision in his head because small towns were full of freaks) hadn't been quite so desperate to kiss him like this might be the last time. Scott didn’t kiss him when they practiced fooling around with each other because that would just make it weird. 

Stiles was young and so full of hormones that he was bursting with them, spewing hormones into the air like toxic rain. He could get behind this plan.

Jackson's mouth was open and slick under his, perfect teeth and thick full lips. Stiles had to get his hands on his face, run his thumbs over his cheek bones and lick deeper into his mouth, sloppy and eager.

It was so fast that Stiles' head was spinning and he felt hot all over, like he was sitting directly in the sunlight. He was pretty much hard against his jeans already just from the wet slide of Jackson's mouth over his. In a move of blatant hopefulness, Stiles clambered over the median and tried to shove himself in the passenger seat with Jackson. The Jeep was a beast of a car to learn to drive on, huge around the hips, but there was just enough space for them both despite the fact that they were both wide in the shoulders from playing lacrosse. Jackson blinked at Stiles, licking at his lips and giving him that ridiculous imperious smirk that made Stiles want to slap it off his face.

He bit him instead.

Jackson squeaked, high and unmanly, jerking under Stiles' weight, only he was pinned by the way that Stiles was kneeling on his thighs. Jackson's face went slack, eyes glassy.

Stiles couldn't help but laugh at him. Jackson flushed, embarrassed all the way up to the roots of his hair, turning away, chin tilted up in indication that he was going to fight. Feeling the situation slip out of his control, Stiles dug his fingers into Jackson's jaw and pulled him back around for another biting, stinging kiss.

The fight went out of Jackson in a wave; he melted back against the seat, tilting his head back and up letting Stiles lead the kiss. Jackson sucked lazily on his tongue, and that had a direct line to his dick, feeling the pull down there too. Stiles groaned against Jackson's mouth, unable to grind against Jackson without raising up on his knees a little so he could press his hips against Jackson's stomach and hump the soft cotton of his pull-over. And Jackson? He just let him, fingers twisted in his belt loops and tugging him closer still. "I can smell how turned on you are," Jackson growled against his mouth, words vibrating against his lips.

Stiles moaned high and tight. Jackson's unexpected pliancy was stupidly hot. Like, Stiles was going to explode because Jackson was just so fucking perfect.

"Didn't see this coming." Stiles hissed against Jackson's mouth.

"What?" Jackson's voice scraped out of him, sounding rough already.

He arched his back, shoving up under Stiles, looking for another kiss. Stiles couldn't deny that for all the curly fries in the world.

There was a dim part of his mind that was keenly aware he was humping Jackson's abs like a dog and panting against his mouth, almost desperately close already. Jackson's big hands slid under the hem of his shirt, rubbing hot against his lower back and just resting there distractingly.

He wanted to say something—anything—the yellowed light of the nearest street lamp filtering in through the wind-screen and making Jackson's eyes seem huge and dark and filled with shadows. "Scott couldn't do this when he was new," Stiles breathed, curious. Cursing when Jackson went still, mouth bruised red but pushed into an unattractive scowl. "I mean with Allison. He told me." Stiles babbled, refusing to move when Jackson shoved at his shoulders. "He would lose control."

Jackson scowled harder.

"I can't," he said, ashamed face flushing and that wet-eyed look should have been ugly on him but Stiles could feel his dick jerk something small and vicious in his stomach twisting. _Christ._ "I can't change on my own." Jackson's breath hitched and they were so close that Stiles could feel the motion against his own chest. Jackson's distinctly human nails dug into his skin; eight bright points of pain. "Derek has to force me."

Stiles kissed him hard because he couldn't keep looking at him. Had to do something. Jackson, who probably would have shoved him bodily off if he had tried to say anything, at least seemed familiar with physical comfort.

"Well, that makes me feel a lot better. I'm sick of being attacked by wolves." Stiles laughed.

"Shut up." Jackson bit at him, tugging at the button to his jeans in an obviously defensive change of tactics, and it might have made him a bad person, but Stiles' brain shorted out around there and he really didn't care what he had to say to keep Jackson doing that.

A hot palm pressed awkwardly against his dick. Stiles pushed up and into it shamelessly, didn't really care about how Jackson had to twist his wrist to manage it.

Because it went over so well last time, Stiles bit at his mouth again, letting his teeth catch the fullness of Jackson's bottom lip and sucking it into his mouth to worry at the hot skin. Jackson squirmed under him, a full body kind of twist between his thighs. If he sat back he'd lose the perfect friction against his dick, so he just bit at Jackson's mouth, worrying the skin until Jackson was panting and whining.

"Like that?" Stiles said, trying on a cocky grin, feeling flushed and perfect. Jackson managed half a glare, his mouth slick and swollen red.

Jackson tugged at the button to his jeans, popping them, his other hand grabbing Stiles by the ass and digging his fingers into the muscle there through his baggy jeans. "Shut up." Jackson hedged. He'd learned not to turn his head away; each time he did Stiles would grab his jaw and force him back like a misbehaving dog.

Jackson shoved his shirt up to his armpits and Stiles let him, leaning back a little so that Jackson could run his hands from his shoulders down the strong lines of his ribs and across his stomach to the open vee of his fly. He was wearing Spider-Man boxers and later Stiles would be embarrassed about it, but right now the head of his dick was pushing obscenely against one of the Spidey faces.

Jackson let out a huffing, incredulous sound.

"What? I didn't know you were going to lose your mind today." Stiles refused to be embarrassed by his pants. "Or else I would have wore a lacy thong."

Jackson snorted but didn't comment further. Instead he ran his hands up the naked sweep of Stiles' back, the motion feeling oddly tender, to cup the back of his head and bring him down for another kiss. Thankfully, this managed to muffle the truly and horrendously undignified sound that he would have made when Jackson practically dislocated his shoulder so he could get a hand between them and on Stiles' dick. Through the thin cotton of his boxers the heat was too much, hot palm and the phantom sensation of his fingers.

Why oh why didn't he have condoms in here? (Mostly because, as ever-hopeful as he was, he also knew that hell was freezing over now that he was actually getting laid in his car. The devil was doing figure eights on the frozen lakes.)

"More room in the back seat," Stiles said, biting at Jackson's lower lip again; it had to be sore but he whined high in his throat and writhed, pushing up.

"Yeah, okay – whatever," Jackson breathed, refusing to let go even when Stiles made a move to crawl between the seats, towards the back.

"Come on," Stiles hissed, pressing his wet mouth to curve of Jackson's cheek, feeling out the shape with just the tip of his tongue.

"Make me," Jackson replied, pressing the words with shallow bites along Stiles' neck. Stiles groaned and gave up, twisted his fingers through Jackson's hair and held him there so he could feel his tongue sliding along the bump of his throat.

"Can you hear my pulse?" Stiles asked. Jackson stilled, worrying a bit of skin delicately between his teeth.

"Yeah." Jackson sighed.

"Then you can hear how much I really, really want to get you in the back seat."

Jackson paused then, giving him an odd look. He looked away for a moment, giving the steering wheel an odd look. This time he said it very carefully. " _Make._ Me."

Stiles was many, many things. Dumb wasn't often one of them (easily distracted wasn’t the same thing at all, just ask any of his teachers.) He paused, watched the flush of Jackson's face and the way he kept looking away. He was no Sherlock but, _a-ha_ , that was a clue. Actually, that was a slap in the face and he was kind of stupid for not noticing, but seriously, it was like Twilight Zone shit.

"Really?" he breathed, eager and embarrassed all at once.

"No," Jackson snarled, embarrassed now.

Stiles had a moment to think, grabbed Jackson by the hair, and shoved his head back again, exposing his throat the way the wolves on the billions of Nature Channel documentaries he watched did. Jackson let out a high startled sound.

"Get in the back seat," Stiles said trying to make himself sound commanding, but his voice hitched and shook.

Jackson nodded, just enough to designate agreement and to test the hold that Stiles had on him.

"Say it," Stiles said, voice still too higher and wavering, but his grip on Jackson kept his hands from twitching nervously. They felt reassuringly steady when he shook Jackson.

"Yes," Jackson breathed.

Stiles clambered over the seats, landing with a _whump_ in the back seat. The windows were beginning to fog; he'd meant to roll them down but Jackson was falling into the back seat with him. There was slightly more room but they were both jockeying for it, shoving and pulling at each other. 

The awkward laugh caught in his throat as he found himself splayed in the back seat, back pressed up against the door

Jackson was hunched between his legs, all curled up to fit in what space was left on the seat. Stiles could see the arch and ridge of his spine, the pale rows of his vertebrae under his skin shifting as he breathed; lost himself a little in just trying to note down every single detail, from the freckles he could barely make out in the low light, to the slightly crispy feel of Jackson's hair product. He could just make out the band of his briefs, dark where Jackson's jeans gapped at the back.

"You gonna suck me?" Stiles said, trying to make it sound self-assured and sexy and missing it by a mile, sounding more uncertain and painfully eager.

"Depends," Jackson said evenly. From this angle, Jackson's lashes were a pale fan against his cheeks. Stiles touched them gently, Jackson pressing up lightly against the touch. He twisted his head so he could nip at the tips of Stiles' fingers with sharp teeth.

Stiles almost passed out, he was so turned on just by the idea. Seriously, he felt light-headed and like he wasn't quite breathing deep enough. It was only the idea of the sheer embarrassment of being the first teenager to actually die from having sex that kept him clinging to the moment with all the determination of a bulldog.

"Just do it," Stiles said, resting his hand on the back of Jackson's neck, over where those four scars were. He could feel the way that Jackson shivered under his touch.

"Yeah," Jackson mumbled, nosing against his chest and taking a few deep breaths, pressing a kiss just under Stiles' navel.

He should have been more disturbed that Jackson was essentially sniffing him but he'd been geared up for claws and teeth and an unfortunate hair problem, so the sniffing was pretty sedate. Besides, he was more occupied with the fact that every ounce of grey matter he had was pooling in his dick, leaving him light-headed and stupid.

"Come on," he begged. Jackson just hummed, tugging at his jeans softly without making any real effort.

Stiles dug his fingers into Jackson's neck and Jackson let out a low groan, tugging harder at Stiles' pants, like he couldn't help himself. Later, when he was done jerking off about ten more times to just the memory of Jackson tugging his jeans down his hips, he was going to put actual thought into how surreal this was going.

Jackson drew him out, already completely hard and curving towards his belly.

"I always wanted to try this," Jackson breathed. Stiles bit down hard on his lip to avoid doing anything embarrassing while Jackson licked a slow, curious stripe up the bottom of his cock. He paused, as if compiling a plan of attack just there at the end, pink tongue out for show and just teasingly lapping at the sensitive skin of the head.

Stiles should stop staring.

For lack of a better term, Jackson investigated the lines of his cock with his mouth, letting his lips run up the side, giving obscene kisses to the base.

Stiles let his head thunk back against the window with a curse.

It wasn't like Stiles could tell it was a bad blowjob. In fact, he was willing to swear by the fact that it was the best ever. He accidentally pushed up, one foot catching on the back of the front seat and giving him an unexpected amount of leverage. Jackson choked, throat clicking harshly as he pulled back against the gentle hold Stiles had on the back of his neck.

"Oh shit," Jackson whined, looking up at him, eyes wide and mouth hanging open obscenely, wet with spit. "Do that again."

Bad idea, bad idea, bad idea. "Yeah," Stiles breathed, voice cracking over the vowel sound.

Jackson didn't call him on it, just got back to business, pushing himself harder until he was making these little choking sounds on Stiles' dick.

"We'll teach you how to do this," Stiles rasped. Jackson moaned around him, the vibrations spilling up his spine. "Gagging for it," Stiles wheezed.

Jackson pulled back enough to through him a desperate look. "Shut up." he said, but his voice scratched and skipped like an old CD, his throat sounding raw and abused. They both just stared wildly at each other for a moment before Stiles grabbed the back of his head and pushed him back down to where he wanted him.

Jackson was trying to hump the back seat but with his knees tucked under his chest wasn't having much luck. Apparently he was just as stupid as Stiles was at that moment, spewing out the brain-child of hours of accumulated filthy porn dialogue.

"How far does this go, Jackson?" Stiles babbled, digging his toes into the seat and pushing up ever so slightly. He was close and didn't want to risk choking Jackson too badly—he might pull away again and that bright fevered cliff was just right there. "What else do you want?" Suddenly he thought of the domme and her girl, the loud smack of a slap and the way she writhed and moaned. "Would you let me spank you?" The words didn't come out like he meant them, wasn't quite sure what he meant. Jackson whined high and tight, eyes pressed shut. "Fucking, yes. You wont even bruise for very long, will you?"

He wanted it so bad he was actually dizzy with the idea. Jackson, hiding his face because he was ashamed but letting Stiles do whatever he wanted. _Shit_.

He came suddenly, everything going tight and hot for one long, thin, stretched out moment, until the edges dulled, getting brittle and cracking.

Jackson was coughing, spraying his stomach with spit and come, flakes of moisture reaching where his shirt had fallen down again amidst all the twisting.

"Sorry," Stiles hummed, watching him from under the fan of his own lashes Jackson gasping. His mouth was ruined, so red it had to be burning. "Come here." Stiles grabbed his shoulder and tugged him down, against his chest.

Kissing him tasted weird—bitter—and Jackson hissed, jerking back when Stiles tried to lick at his lips.

He gave into the kisses when Stiles managed to worm a hand between them, palming Jackson's dick. "Beg," Stiles breathed against his mouth.

Jackson stared at him with huge eyes that almost glowed in the faint light before they were shuttered as he squeezed his eyes tight. "Fuck you," Jackson moaned, twisting and pushing into his grip.

"Come on. You want to," Stiles said against his ear. Jackson's hair smelled like chemicals and rain. "Beg pretty for me."

"Please," Jackson broke a lot quicker than Stiles would have anticipated, hiding his face against Stiles' shoulder. "I want to come."

"When you're ready."

There was no way that they could not get it all over them, not with how they were kama sutra'd into the back seat. Jackson came all over his jeans with a sharp muffled sound, shaking through it while Stiles rested heavily against the door, taking both of their weight for a long moment.

The silence that ensued was almost not awkward.

Almost.

"So. That wasn't on my ten year plan of getting Lydia to go out with me," Stiles said, watching his own hand curl around the strong lines of Jackson's shoulder with a sort of dissociated interest.

"Lydia was never going to sleep with you," Jackson huffed, still hiding his face.

"I didn't think you were ever going to sleep with me either, but look how that turned out," Stiles said, full of indignation.

This was clearly not what Jackson wanted to hear. He pulled away, both of them faintly sweaty and covered in a right mess. Stiles tried not to stare at the way Jackson's mouth was still all red and shiny and failed horribly in that.

"I don't want to talk about it." Jackson was shutting down already, scrubbing his hand over his mouth, trying to do something about the slickness that covered his chin and now most of Stiles' shoulder too. Stiles busied himself with tucking his dick back into the protective comforts of Spider-Man and shimmying his jeans higher. This was not something to be discussed while he was flapping in the wind, so to speak.

"Then what should we talk about?" Stiles bit out, sarcasm already recharged and ready to rip into the fact that Jackson was perfectly willing to let Stiles push him around when they were sort of having sex.

Neither of them were paying any attention to anything but the crackling tension. They missed the foot steps. Neither of them missed the sharp rap on the window accompanied by the curious probe of a flashlight.

"Shit." Stiles swore.

The car stunk of sex, Jackson was wrecked and shirtless, their legs still more tangled together than less. A flash light circle tried to see through the fogged windows.

He hit the automatic window and almost vomited on the very spot.

His dad looked at him for one long, professional moment before shining his flash light on Jackson, whom instinctively put his arm up to shield his eyes but was still blatantly recognizable. "You know what. I am not even going to ask. Clearly a lot has changed about being a teenager."

Stiles was feeling dizzy again but it wasn't a good dizzy. "Um." Glib tongue had gone and crawled up his ass or somewhere else unhelpful.

"I will let you off with a warning. There is still a curfew on. Take this home now." His dad shook his head, “we will talk about this later.” 

"Yeah," Stiles said lamely, nodding hard.

His dad walked back to the cruiser parked up the way on the trail.

Stiles began to laugh so hard he was going to cry. "Freak," Jackson mumbled, fishing around for his shirt.

When Stiles felt a little less hysterical he drove Jackson back to his house first. By the time they got there, Jackson looked almost normal, except his hair was pushed this way and that, flat on one side. "So that was mortifying," Stiles said cheerfully once they stopped in front of Jackson's posh house.

Jackson gave him a bitchy look. Sarcasm was not appreciated.

"Look. I'm pretty sure I meant everything I said back there," Stiles snarled and Jackson snorted.

"Pretty sure."

"Oh god." Stiles grabbed him and kissed whatever irritating, bitchy thing Jackson was going to say next right out of his mouth. He licked up the words and dug his fingers into his jaw until Jackson sighed softly against his mouth. "You are so—" Stiles bit off the last word.

Jackson just gave him an irritated look.

"See you at school," Stiles sighed, watching Jackson go. He contemplated just picking a direction and driving until he ran out of gas. Drop out of high school and run away from home. The future flipping burgers in a fast-food chain taunted him again like a ghost of bad decisions and stale fries past.

Okay. He would need to deal with his dad sometime.

Stiles stared wistfully at the stars. Maybe a sink hole would open under his car and just swallow him off the face of the earth. One could only wish.

He woke up the next morning with a faint imprint of Jackson's teeth on his jaw and the sinking feeling like he really wanted to call in sick today. While simultaneously wanting to see if he could make Jackson make those sounds again. In the end he got up and got dressed like it was any other morning. Dad slept late when he had the night-shift and Stiles had never been more relieved. He really, really didn’t want to talk about it. Ever. 

"Does this mean, like, we're going steady?" Stiles asked as Jackson sat down next to him in the bleachers. 

Jackson gave him the bitchiest look. Stiles bit the inside of his cheek, conflicted—that was somewhere between irritating and hot. Stiles scowled.

"Why, do you want my lacrosse jersey?" Jackson bit back.

"Thanks but no thanks. I've got my own and it's far better." Jackson just kind of snorted. He crossed his ankles, long legs spread across the bleachers like the king of a low-rent, rickety kingdom. Even the way he looked down his nose was regal. "Are you here to threaten me into keeping quiet? Or maybe—"

Jackson cut him off with a sharp snarl.

"I'm right. I'm totally right." Stiles managed not to wiggle, he was a _sex god_ , kept them coming back for more. He was like Ron Jeremy but with better hair. “You want more.” 

"Stop making that face, it's fugly," Jackson said, staring hard at the field in the sunlight. He looked like he was blushing a little, ears going delightfully pink. Stiles had to remind himself that Jackson had a longer kill record than most inmates on death row or else he was going to go insane. He couldn't be feeling this tender, because Jackson had so many issues and cracks in his persona he was like one filthy rich, walking bruise, a poster boy for the fact that money can't make you happy.

"I can't help it. You're hot for my dick."

Jackson made an outraged sound and Stiles laughed, not entirely unkind. "Fuck you, Stilinski."

"Tonight? My dad has the night shift." He didn't even try not to sound eager. Jackson eyed him suspiciously for a moment. He did this full body fidget thing before he nodded tightly, his jaw screaming murder and mouth down-turned into something someone who didn't know Jackson might call a pout. "Don't forget to get all dolled up." Stiles called at his retreating back and Jackson flipped him off over his shoulder. When he walked away he was strutting and Stiles smiled to himself just a little.

After school, Scott went to hop into the passenger side of his car, already talking about the weekend coming up in a few days and instantly cut off, jumping right out like a startled cat.

"Oh my **god**. Jackson? Really?" Scott stared at him, wide-eyed and confused.

Stiles considered being ashamed of himself for all of three seconds.

"Come on, man. I totally tapped that, put it here." Stiles held out a fist and Scott stared at him for a long moment as if he wasn't sure. Stiles really needed him to back him up on this.

"Yeah, okay, dude." Scott gave him the bro-fist bump of approval. After all, he had still made it to second base with one of the most attractive people in the entire student body. If you ignore everything else that was still a gold-medal worthy achievement in the pantheon of bro-first worthy achievements. "So—Jackson?"

"A gentleman never kisses and tells," Stiles said with all the mock posh he could manage. Scott just laughed and slid back into the seat, reaching for his seatbelt as Stiles threw it into gear.

"I'll let you know when I see a gentleman," Scott replied.

Stiles' good mood lasted all the way until he found Peter doing the creep in his backyard. "Dire warnings and gloom?" Stiles asked and Peter just arched a single eyebrow with a slow curve to his mouth. Seriously, the Hale family was a bit of a one-trick pony. Also the joke never got any more funny no matter how many times he said it. 

"Just checking to see what happened. If we've learned anything, it is that communication is key." Peter drawled, an awful smirk hiding around the corners of his mouth. 

Stiles just glared at him.

"I'll tell you this out of the goodness of my heart." Like such a thing even existed. "You and Jackson, did you really think that I was anything like Derek? Popping up to give cryptic warnings because I just felt so gosh darn happy about society?"

Stiles would have hit him if he didn't know better already. Instead, he clenched his jaw and tried to stand taller, straighter, the way his dad did when he was facing things he didn't want to.

"Explain."

"I was hoping you, the brains of the operation, would have figured it out already." Stiles hadn't known you could even sound that condescending even if the words themselves were playfully light.

"Turned wolves are odd creatures. They tend to fixate." Like Allison wasn't the only person who knew that better than Stiles. "Jackson was the taciturn child, so fussy." Peter shrugged liquidly. "He fixated on the trauma left from the kanima and wanted things that Derek was too uncomfortable to give him. I told you, you could have been an Alpha."

"Wait." If he could keep his mind from racing, something was there; patterns forming from so much grey matter. 

"Hunting tactics." Peter reminded him viciously. 

Of course. Jackson had always been the kind to crumble under pressure and probably liked being bossed around (Read: Lydia) before the whole thing. Then the kamina was a tool, a puppet—it was _content_ when it was being of use. Peter wasn't about to try and bring Scott and Jackson closer because, while it would mean they would have to work together, Scott was the one in charge of their little alternative pack family. Balance must be kept, as Yoda would say.

Jackson almost ripped to pieces in the last battle; _they had already picked the weakest._

"They are coming after us all," Peter said, watching him for the explosion.

Stiles was furious, shaking with it, but held by nothing more than his own determination. He could almost forgive the fact that he was being played, but the anger was so much more. If Peter thought that this meant they were just going to happily join Derek's pack, he had another thing coming. As if telling him made it all better.

"You know what? **Fuck you**."

"It's only a matter of time. We needed to be stronger." Faster, better, stronger—was no one ever _good enough_?

Peter didn't have the good grace to fade away, making Stiles watch his retreating back the whole way.

Jackson showed up not even an hour later, when Stiles was done furiously cooking dinner and wishing he could do more to vent than dice onions into an almost-puree. All the doubts he'd been thinking about since he dropped Jackson off the night before seemed so petty suddenly. 

Stiles kissed him hard while Jackson just gave him a suspicious look, licking his lips. Stiles had just enough tact to know that if he told Jackson what Peter said he was going to lose him completely, so he didn't say anything specific. "I hate Peter."

"Finally, something we agree on."

 

\--

 

He was getting used to the fact that WWBD was a legitimate part of his life now: **W** hat **W** ould **B** uffy **D** o? He was also getting used to the way that Jackson's cheek fit into his palm, but he would try and bite his fingers because he was a contrary asshole despite being a touch-hungry slut. He was getting used to the way Jackson pushed up against the contact when Stiles ran his hand down his spine. Most of all he was already used to the way that Jackson kissed to say things that he didn’t have words for. (It wasn’t like Stiles didn’t have enough words for the both of them).

Lydia kept giving him these weird looks, but she seemed to have mended something with Allison because they were at least talking to each other now, and Stiles could actually say that he was happy about that. He hated seeing her alone. Allison and Scott hadn’t mended any fences and while Scott would mope he seemed startlingly okay with this. 

There wasn't anything he could do about the crushing paranoia, just press Jackson slick and open against his expensive sheets and work out how to cope. The Alpha pack was coming and there wasn't anything they could do about it but fight back. He wasn't going to do it Peter's way or Derek's way. Scott had a plan and Stiles was going to stand next to him right where he belonged.

 

Well-- _Come at me bro._


End file.
